The present invention relates generally to a computer implemented method, data processing system, and computer program product for responding to power events. More specifically, the present invention relates to responding to calls to scale up or scale down electrical power consumption by selectively increasing or reducing power to virtual partitions.
Electrical power producers respond to overall power consumed on an electrical power grid. When electrical power consumption exceeds a capacity of a grid to provide electrical power, the electrical power producers must change the distribution of electrical power to avoid failures. In the past, these changes in distribution result in the lowering of voltage in electrical power supplied to geographic areas, commonly referred to as a brownout. More drastic changes in the distribution may result in blackouts.
Datacenters are large energy consumers, and thus must often work closely with local power companies. In the event of rolling blackouts or brownouts, power companies may contact large consumers such as datacenters and demand that the datacenter administrators reduce their power consumption in order to reduce demand on the power grid.